


The Sounds of Life

by Trobadora



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s01e03 The Great Game, Episode: s02e01 A Scandal in Belgravia, Gen, Moriarty's death wish, The Pool Scene (Sherlock)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-16 10:25:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13634391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trobadora/pseuds/Trobadora
Summary: An alternate ending for the pool scene fromThe Great Game/A Scandal in Belgravia: What if Irene hadn't called?





	The Sounds of Life

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Deejaymil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deejaymil/gifts).



> A huge thank you to my amazing beta for her invaluable help!

Red laser dots dance over John's body, over his. Resignation, terror, resolve fall over John's face. Behind Sherlock's back, Moriarty has returned, and their short meet-and-greet is turning into something else. Something, but what? Sherlock's thoughts fly.

Moriarty claps his hands. "Sorry, boys, I'm so changeable!" he announces, and casually declares his intention to stop Sherlock, once and for all.

It irks Sherlock that he can't read the man, not with any degree of reliability - irks, and fascinates. But given all that has come before, Moriarty can't simply mean to have them shot. That would be too simple; too dull. He could have done that any day, anywhere. What would be the point?

No; there's a different plan.

A glance at John, still sitting against the wall. John gives a jerky nod of support. 

Sherlock turns around to face Moriarty again. With assurance, he points his gun at the bomb still lying on the tiles between them, and calls Moriarty's bluff.

Moriarty stands by the deep end of the pool, hands in his pockets, exuding confidence and control. Sherlock watches Moriarty's minuscule smile, waiting for a reaction, for the next clue.

Nothing happens. No one speaks up; no shots fall; no phone rings. Nothing interrupts the moment. Only Moriarty's smile spreads wide, and wider. 

It isn't fear or frustration behind that smile - of course not. Moriarty, naturally, is unsurprised by Sherlock's move. It was a bit obvious, wasn't it? But it's not amusement or satisfaction either, for this deliberately engineered stalemate, nor anticipation for the next move.

It's nothing Sherlock expected.

  


* * *

  


_Rewind:_ a sudden flash of memory, recognition of something overlooked.

"The sounds of life, Sherlock," the hostage's strained voice said. "But don't worry, I can soon fix that."

  


* * *

  


Moriarty's eyes turn towards the bomb. He's closer to it than Sherlock, and he strolls forward now, just a few steps, then smiles down at it. He is still smiling as he raises his head, looks straight at Sherlock, meets his eyes.

And what's behind that smile stops Sherlock cold. Not anticipation, not amusement, not calculation. Instead, it's _hunger_.

It's hunger, and in the fraction of a second when comprehension hits, Sherlock feels his mind - racing until then, calculating, deducing, speculating - stall. A false stroke on his violin, a melody gone suddenly out of tune.

The melody - complex and unpredictable and beautiful until now - turns to a screech as the bow slips.

  


* * *

  


_Rewind:_

"The sounds of life, Sherlock," the hostage said. A man's strained voice, but Sherlock isn't listening to him now; he's listening for the voice he could, then, _almost_ sense behind it. The puppeteer, the spider at the centre of the web.

Now that he does know the voice, he can decipher what passed him by before.

It's a voice unlike any he'd imagined, and he rather suspects he could analyse it for days without untangling all its layers, but still, what pops into being at the forefront of his mind is a close enough approximation. 

"The sounds of life, Sherlock," Moriarty's voice tells him again, almost wryly. Sherlock can see the mild smile that comes with the phrase, the crinkling around the eyes. Then a sudden hardening, lips pressed thin, curling into a sneer: "But don't worry, I can soon fix that." And Moriarty's nose scrunches just slightly in distaste.

Yes, close enough.

_Fix that._

  


* * *

  


Sherlock's mind stutters. Comprehension hits. Fascination turns flat.

Unplanned, unbidden from Sherlock's lips: "No!", an outcry of revulsion, denial, disdain.

Moriarty's eyes go cold.

  


* * *

  


_Rewind:_

Time zooms back and he hears it again. "The sounds of life, Sherlock," Moriarty says through his hostage's mouth. "But don't worry, I can soon fix that." Not just flippancy, not just the casual disregard for human life Sherlock initially deduced.

 _Life._ Fixing it means death, obviously, but why does it need fixing? What is death fixing?

 _Fix it._ For whom? Not for the hostage; not for the people on the street who could be heard in the background. Not for Sherlock, either, despite the promise offered him like a gift. ( _Was_ it a gift - was it meant as a gift?)

Fix it: for Moriarty himself.

  


* * *

  


Those eyes, now, dark and glittering in the bluish light reflecting from the pool. That smile, half satisfied half hungry.

Sherlock's denial is instinctive. This is not the Moriarty he expected - the Moriarty he wanted. How dare he? All of this, just for _that_? 

Moriarty was delighted a moment ago, revelling in the brilliance of the game - where did that go? Wasn't it genuine? It was - Sherlock is certain; every clue available points in that direction.

( _We were made for each other,_ Moriarty had made his hostage say. _I have loved this_ , he'd said in his own voice, and meant it. After all, Sherlock has loved it, too.)

Now, there's only Sherlock's narrowed eyes, Moriarty's cold glare. Disappointment. A spark of anger, igniting in the air between them.

Sherlock's? Moriarty's? Both. 

Both, but Moriarty still has the upper hand. Self-destruction is boring, and Sherlock wants to sulk, to turn away in contempt, but there are snipers, and a bomb, and he can't afford to. This was deadly before, but Sherlock's impulsive outcry has broken what rapport they had, and the danger has just amplified.

  


* * *

  


_Rewind:_

He didn't notice at the time, but now that he has, it reverberates through his brain: _But don't worry, I can soon fix that._

Fix that. _Fix_ that. Peculiar word choice. Why does it need fixing? _Does_ it need fixing?

No, never mind. That's not what he needs right now.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock casts his mind beyond the obstacle because he has to, tries to find a connection again. Aren't they the same? Enough to matter, he'd thought.

Sherlock had counted on Moriarty to want him alive; everything so far had pointed to that. And to want _himself_ alive, of course. But he's seen the result of one of these bombs, a dozen people dead in the explosion. If that bomb goes off, none of them are going to survive. Not Sherlock, not John - not Moriarty.

Which, of course, is exactly what Moriarty wants. 

Sherlock should have seen it before. A stupid mistake to make. The clues were all there, after all.

Moriarty purses his lips into a condescending smirk, twirls a hand. "Get on with it, now." Sing-song, "Time is running out!"

"How about I don't?" Sherlock fires back quickly, thoughtlessly. Playing for time. "I'd hate to be too predictable."

 _No time. Think._ He knows Moriarty. Not well, no - not the person. But his mind - he understands how his mind operates, just fine. They are the same, bored in a world of boredom, creating their own profession in their search for diversion. Picking the cleverest problems to play with.

Bored: _that_ bored? He'd thought Moriarty was enjoying their game. Wasn't he? Why isn't it enough, the thrill of it, when for Sherlock, it offered a diversion far better than any he'd had before?

Moriarty rolls his head back, mouth open, and one corner of his lips pulls down into a lopsided grimace. "You are, though," he says, his face twisting into an exaggerated expression of sadness. "Pre-dict-able. Or you will be." Harsh, loud, a shout: _"That's how it goes!"_

It echoes through the empty swimming pool.

How it goes: boredom, and when there's none, still, inevitably, the expectation of boredom. Sherlock's mind whirls -

 _Never mind._ Even he can't solve the problem of Moriarty's boredom in thirty seconds, which is as much time as he estimates he has - he's never yet defeated his own. If Sherlock won't play his part, Moriarty will simply force his hand. And right there behind Sherlock, out of sight but certainly not out of mind, red laser lights dancing over his body, is the obvious lever.

John Watson.

Threatening John will move him, too, just as Moriarty planned. Genius, really. Sherlock can't help but admire it. He might despise what Moriarty does, but _how_ he does it -

 _Never mind that now._ How it goes, is it? "I'll take that bet," Sherlock snaps out, flippant as he can. Offers a sharp grin, a challenge. "Think you can predict the future better than me?" 

It's empty banter, though. Shadow play. It won't take him far. He needs to find an alternative, quickly, before Moriarty acts and there are no choices left. 

Moriarty, meanwhile, rolls his eyes. "Can't prove a negative, Sherlock," he says lightly. And his eyes move, ever so slowly, away from Sherlock, focusing on something behind him. Someone. John.

 _Tick-tock,_ say his eyes.

Mind racing, frantically running through calculations, Sherlock sifts through and discards ideas until one option takes shape. 

( _I don't want to rush it_ , Moriarty said, before he turned around and rushed them towards their ending.)

Sherlock takes his chance. He lets the gun drop to his side, takes a few steps forward. Closer to the bomb, closer to Moriarty. Closer, until they're face to face. Bows his head slightly, meets Moriarty's eyes. The silence charges between them as Sherlock once more takes in every clue he can see on Moriarty's body, in Moriarty's face, in his eyes. All put there to be found. All useless, even the ones that are true.

Moriarty waits, an infuriating air of mild patience about him.

Sherlock purses his lips into a pout. "You cheated," he accuses, drawing on something real. For Moriarty, nothing less will do. "Five pips, and, what, I don't even get a fifth puzzle?"

Moriarty's eyes widen a fraction, deliberate or not. His head sways as he stretches his neck in the slightly reptilian way he's demonstrated before. "Disappointed?"

"Yes." In more ways than one. Unfortunately, Moriarty knows.

Distraction, challenge, stimulation; a mind to rival his own: he'd wanted that. A perfect foil; a perfect match for his mind. He'd never considered the human behind it.

He must consider him now.

"Well." Moriarty looks up at the high ceiling, unconcerned. But threats aside, not yet forcing the end. "You did find those nice missile plans for me." His smile, when he looks at Sherlock again, holds something of the old delight, the mood that permeated the first part of their meeting.

Something is buzzing, sizzling under Sherlock's skin. Adrenaline, of course. Chemistry.

"That hardly counts." Scorn is an easy affect to bring to the forefront right now. "Not yours; not a puzzle. You threw them away, too."

Moriarty's chin dimples with a smile, and something in his eyes seems far away. "I did appreciate the gesture, Sherlock." 

It flashes through Sherlock's mind: Moriarty lifting the flash drive to his lips, then casually tossing it into the pool. _Did_ he appreciate it? Or was it only another opportunity to catch Sherlock on the wrong foot, hand-delivered by Sherlock himself?

He shouldn't care. For the challenge, the distraction, it doesn't matter at all. But there's a man behind the puzzles, after all.

A man, not a spider. A person, not only a mind. If Sherlock has a heart, he shouldn't be surprised Moriarty appears to be in possession of one himself.

But then, until Moriarty called him on his bluff, he'd always preferred to deny its existence.

Their eyes meet. Moriarty's focus has returned to Sherlock. Something burns between them, flares: recognition, connection. Truth.

A rapport, re-established.

Sherlock doesn't delude himself the danger has in any way lessened. After all, he knows what Moriarty wants. Death, and not just any death: a shared ending for them both. 

Sherlock has one reason, though, one counter-argument to offer - and now is the time for it.

The coup de grâce, quick and sharp like a knife: "You owe me one more." 

An abrupt movement from behind him. Sherlock can hear - and he knows Moriarty can hear - John's reaction as clearly as if he'd spoken: _What the hell, Sherlock?_

Five pips, five challenges. A promise: something owed.

An offer of himself as a stimulant, an anodyne for boredom. As Moriarty is for him: an unthought-of, unhoped-for challenge, a mind to meet his, vibrant in a dull world.

Rustling behind him: John sitting up straighter. Shock, fear, frustration. Sherlock ignores it. There will be time for explanations later, if he manages to extricate them. If there is a way to explain this to John, when even Sherlock very nearly missed the clues, took too-long moments to grasp the obvious.

Never mind; he can't save John now if he lets his focus falter. Sherlock is still locked in a deadly stand-off with someone who has, with justification, been called a monster. Despite the pleasure of the game, he won't let himself forget. 

Now, though, he knows there's more to him than that. A let-down at first, compared to the Moriarty he'd imagined, who was beyond such things. Something else now, something new.

A man, not a spider. It holds promise.

Moriarty has stilled. His eyes have wandered towards the bomb again. Pensive. Not angry. Contemplating Sherlock's offer. "Do I?"

Sherlock takes another step closer, pitches his voice deep. "You do. You owe me." _We owe each other something better than this._

He hadn't thought beyond this game of theirs, before. He realises now he'd simply assumed the future _would_ , in some way, contain Moriarty. The alternative is not one he is willing to accept.

Moriarty bounces slightly on the balls of his feet. He examines Sherlock's face for a long moment, reading what he can read of his thoughts. "Maybe I do," he says eventually, not entirely reluctantly - yes, there _is_ something still conflicted in him. Something wishing for more, for better than just a quick explosion, a quick ending. Finally, for once, Sherlock has judged him right. "One more dance, Sherlock."

Sherlock smirks, both at the promise and at the victory. At the prospect of _more_. "Make it a good one."

Moriarty's eyes grow hard. "Better work on your steps, my dear. You'd _hate_ to disappoint me."

  


* * *

  


"What the hell was that?" John asks as they leave, and it's so clearly complaint and confusion and anger all mixed up, Sherlock hesitates for a moment, unsure which to address first.

"He'd have let me shoot that bomb," he says instead, answering all and none of the above.

  


* * *

  


_Rewind:_

 _Fix that._ Sherlock didn't notice before, but now that he has, he wonders how he ever missed it.

Moriarty's own words: Sherlock was straining for a clue, but when it came, it passed him by, dismissed as a flippant remark.

John's voice, indignant, asking, "So people come to him wanting their crimes fixed up, like booking a holiday?" - Sherlock's own voice, quoting a catchphrase: "Dear Jim, please will you fix it for me." Reminders everywhere, and nothing snagged at Sherlock's mind. It was there, obvious, and he never noticed a thing.

But he's on to it now - on to _him_ , finally, after all.

  


* * *

  


"He's going to do it again," John says, pacing angrily between kitchen and windows. "He's going to have some poor sod strapped in Semtex, and he'll blow him up if you don't play his game. Again. Because of you. Because you _asked_ him to."

All very likely true. A concern for later, though. Sherlock shrugs, flops back on the sofa. "We're still alive, aren't we?"

"And that's all." Censure. Disappointment. Fear. "All that you care about."

"Would you rather he'd blown us up?" Sherlock retorts. Of course, that's not what was going to happen, even if he'd seen it too late. It was Sherlock who'd have been doing the blowing up, to prevent worse.

He should be more bothered by that, perhaps. But now that he's seen what's behind it, he has other problems. Moriarty still needs stopping, but there have to be better ways than this.

John's face only tightens further, the anger closer and closer to the surface.

"I can do it," Sherlock deflects. "Whatever he throws at me, I can solve it. I can win this, John."

"Can you?" Flatly.

 _An old woman's frail voice. An explosion. Twelve people dead._ Sherlock knows he's failed before. But what hasn't happened yet can still be averted.

Sherlock smiles, sharply. "I'm just going to have to be very good, won't I?" And no one will have to die.


End file.
